Monday, March 30, 2009

Disney Looks to Join Hulu

The La Times reports that Disney are looking to go in with their rivals Fox and NBC and take a stake in Hulu.com. According to ComScore Video Metrix, which tracks online traffic, Hulu is attracting a large audience with an increase 42% up in February to 34.7 million viewers. Although it’s still significantly lower than YouTube, it is growing.

Disney have recognized that they have ‘to go where the people are’ and that ABC.com just isn’t strong enough. So potentially, Disney, Fox and NBC could each end up with 30%, leaving Providence Equity Partners retaining the remaining 10%. It would also leave CBS, which owns TV.com, outside.

The Hulu model has still to make the money needed to fund the costs of producing shows and still threatens to erode the value of established broadcast and cable channels. However, Disney would bring Hulu their content such as "Grey's Anatomy" and "Desperate Housewives," which in turn should fuel the larger audiences and may well help it towards a tipping point.

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